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by
Richard F. Weingroff
Alexis de Tocqueville is best known for Democracy in America, which he wrote after spending 10 months of 1831 and 1832 in the United States on a mission from France to study American prisons (then...
by
Richard F. Weingroff
In the 1964 presidential campaign, President Lyndon B. Johnson defeated his Republican rival, Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, in a landslide victory. From the perspective of the 21st century,...
By Richard F. Weingroff
When President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 on June 29, he launched construction of the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, as it was called. Officials in the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads (BPR) and...
By Richard F. Weingroff
by Richard Weingroff / FHWA News 2022-2023
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By Richard F. Weingroff
Federal Highway Administration
While writing "Busting the Trust: Unraveling the Highway Trust Fund 1968-1978," posted on the Highway History Web site (https://www.fhwa.dot...
by Richard Weingroff / FHWA News 2022
1931 - 2022
by Richard Weingroff / FHWA News 2022
On the other side of Pennsylvania Avenue, across from the Renwick and Blair House, is the Old Executive Office Building, which was completed in 1888 after 17 years of construction. It houses White House staff. Calling it "ornate" doesn't begin to describe it. When the humorist and novelist Mark Twain tried to describe it, he came up with: "the ugliest building in America." President Harry Truman agreed. He called it a "monstrosity." Part of it is open for tours, but not on a Saturday.
That is the end of ceremonial Pennsylvania Avenue. The avenue continues on beyond the Old Executive Office Building. It also continues east of the Capitol. Beyond the White House and the Capitol, though, it is no longer the ceremonial avenue. It is just another major city street.
Back at your hotel, you get out one of the postcards you bought. It shows a view of the White House. You address it to a friend back home, then stop to think. What can you say about Pennsylvania Avenue. Finally, you write, "I just walked up Pennsylvania Avenue. My feet hurt. Wish you were here."